Black Means Safe
by Jazzola
Summary: When the moon vanishes, anything can happen... Even the switching of worlds... Fraphne, partially Shelma hopefully in later chapters.
1. A Vanishing Moon

Daphne couldn't sleep.

As she tossed and turned on her bed in her bedroom in Mystery Inc.'s house, she couldn't figure out why. She wasn't full of energy, she had had enough exercise today swimming in the local pool with Fred, she wasn't ill; she couldn't think of any reason why she might be this way.

"Just go to sleep," she hissed to herself as she turned again, tangling her legs up in the duvet and having to kick it off and lose some of the warmth to get free. A growl of frustration came out of her mouth, and she sighed, remembering giving the same growl when she was a little girl and waiting on Christmas Eve for Santa to come and give her her presents.

It was useless. She just couldn't get any rest at all.

Slowly, quietly, so as not to disturb anyone else, she decided to go next door and see if Fred was asleep.

Creeping out of bed and down the landing, Daphne's fluffy lilac zebra-striped slippers padded on the pine flooring and silently made their way into the room. Fred was sleeping, one hand protruding from the duvet and hanging down from the bed, his eyes lightly closed and his breathing deep and quiet. Daphne moved closer and reached out to touch his hand, and then gasped guiltily as Fred opened his eyes and looked up at her, his blue irises filmed with sleep but warm and bright and curious, as always.

"Mmh… Daph, what're you doing?"

"Sorry."

"For?"  
"Waking you up."

"That's OK. I don't mind."

"Can I…?" She motioned to the duvet, and he smiled and shifted over so that she could sit down.

"Be my guest," he joked as she lowered herself onto the mattress, smiling.

"Thanks," she whispered, grabbing half the duvet and winding it round herself. He moaned as the cold seeped through onto his legs and sat up, wrestling the duvet back and wrapping it round both of them.

"Anyway. Why did you come in here?"

"I couldn't sleep," Daphne murmured, feeling Fred wrapping his arms round her under the duvet and snuggling into his warmth, breathing in the familiar smell of him and the tang of deodorant and aftershave. She cringed inwardly as she said it; it seemed such a childish reason to have woken him up. He didn't seem to mind, and just cuddled her closer.

"Why?"

"I don't know, I just can't."

Fred frowned in the darkness, and Daphne, sensing his silence, reached out and ran her fingers over his face, feeling his expression.

"You're frowning. What's going through that mind of yours, Freddy?"

He smiled, looking down and seeing her sparkly slippers gleaming in the moonlight. He had forgotten to draw his curtains.

"I'm just wondering why. You're not ill or anything, are you?"

"No."

He pressed his palm to her forehead anyway, feeling her temperature, and Daphne smiled at the feel of his hand on her skin but pushed it away gently, taking his hand in hers and stroking it as she leaned against him.

"I probably won't get back to sleep either, you know."

Daphne laughed and leaned up to kiss him.

"Sorry."

"It's not your fault."

Daphne smiled at him as he moved his head slightly and his face was bathed in the moonlight glow, highlighting his features and making her heart race slightly.

"Now I can see you," she joked softly, seeing his mouth curving into a smile.

Then, just like that, the glow disappeared.

"Huh?"

Fred turned, staring out of the window. It was a cloudless night, there wasn't any sign of so much as a wisp of cloud, but yet the moon had just… gone.

"What just happened?" Daphne asked quietly, moving closer to Fred under the covers and staring at where she presumed his head to be.

"I… I… I don't know."

Fred grasped her hand under the duvet and edged out, moving towards the window. Daphne yelped.

"No! Freddy, don't!"

"Why not?"

Fred turned, clearly confused. Daphne reached out and grabbed his pyjama bottoms, and he blushed and grabbed them as well.

"I'll pull them down if you go any closer."

"I'd do the same to you," he warned, prising her hands off and moving one step closer to the window. Daphne leapt up and grabbed him with both arms, pulling him back to the bed.

"Daph! What are you doing?" Fred asked, grabbing her wrists and looking deep into her eyes. Daphne stared into his blue irises and sighed.

"I just have the weirdest feeling. That if you were to go any closer, you would get hurt. Or we'd get hurt. Or just something bad would happen. Please, please don't go any further! Please? Stay here, please, with me. It's probably just some freak of nature that Velma will tell us about in the morning. Just don't go near the window."

Fred stared at her as she spoke, gradually ending and burying her head in his shoulder as a crazy emotion washed through her; loss and grief and… misery. It felt as though she was grieving, but she hadn't grieved for years, since her grandad had died when she was thirteen.

"Daph… I don't know. If you really are that desperate for me to stay here, I'll stay. But I don't get it… why don't you want me to take a look?"

"I just…"

Daphne shuddered, still holding Fred close. He held her back, pressing his lips to her forehead for a second to try and calm her down.

"…I just have this really bad feeling about you going near the window. Like something really bad would happen. Something that would hurt both of us."

"What, like the room would suddenly fall down, or something like that?" Fred asked gently, not making fun of her, trying to decipher what she was feeling and what she was thinking.

"Like that, yeah. Just please stay here. We'll just ask Velma in the morning and she'll come out with something that I probably won't understand but you will and you'll explain it to me and that'll be that. Please just stay here!"

"OK," Fred murmured, still holding her close and smoothing his fingers over her hair, frowning to himself as he held her and she held him back, her arms round his waist, pulling him towards her. The duvet was snuggled around them and Daphne pulled it closer, leaning on Fred's shoulder and closing her eyes.

Within seconds she had fallen asleep.

Fred chuckled to himself and slid Daphne off his shoulder, lying her down on the bed and standing up. With Daphne's nagging gone, his curiosity returned. As she had said, it was probably some phenomenon of the moon, and he wanted to see it with his own two eyes.

He stepped towards the window, his bare feet prickled by the carpet, the hairs on the back of his neck standing up as he saw the dark, lightless sky.

"Whoa," he murmured, reaching out and sliding the window open to get a better look. Chilly air washed over his body as he did so, and he shivered, thinking longingly of the thick duvet and the warmth he had shared with Daphne. His mind floated back to her strange apprehension, her eerie sense that something bad would happen to him. He sighed to himself, thinking of her "women's intuition". It always seemed to crop up on every mystery, some little thing that Daphne put down to her intuition. It was just annoying when it turned out to be right.

The sky was starless, moonless, completely devoid of illumination, and a shiver went through Fred's body as he stared up at it, his eyes wide despite the lack of light and his stance alert.

He blinked.

The world disappeared.

Fred yelped, throwing his hands out to try and grab something, anything, but they didn't find the solid window, the dresser, the curtains; he felt like he was falling into darkness, not like he was losing consciousness, but like he was physically falling…

And then he landed on something and the world really did go completely blank.

* * *

A/N: So. Like the beginning of this one, leave me a review and tell me about it! :) And also, the fluffy slippers- I know this is completely random, but I'm also wearing fluffy zebra-striped glittery slippers! :P Only mine are white rather than lilac. Sorry, that was completely random. Anyway, please please please review, and I hope you enjoyed it! Jazzola :)


	2. A New Ohio

"Are you gonna wake up, or am I gonna take you to the House and have you done with there?"

Fred blearily opened his eyes as a voice, harsh and flavoured with an accent he had never heard before, made its way to his ears. He was lying on the pavement, which didn't feel like any kind of pavement he knew (not that he lay on pavements often), and his head was aching as though it had been put through a strainer.

"We don't have street people on this street, mister. You should know that, even though you don't look like a nearer."

The unfamiliar term confused Fred, but the message was clear; stand up and get out of the way of this person. He pushed himself up groggily, leaning against the wall and taking in the person speaking properly. He was fairly old, with a grey, neatly-trimmed moustache and clothes that looked as though they belonged to someone living in olden-days Britain.

"Can you give me a hand getting this one out of the road as well?" the man asked, seeing Fred's face properly and giving him a smile, pointing to another person slumped in the road. "I don't mean any harm by this, I really don't, it's the orders of my superiors and I need a roof over my head."

Fred nodded, his brain completely befuddled by what was happening, and reached down to help the man with a young red-headed woman.

His heart leapt into his mouth as he saw that it was Daphne, but all he did was help to lean her against the wall and smile back at the man as he carried on his way.

As soon as the man was out of sight, he turned towards Daphne and began trying to shake her awake. She responded with a sleepy moan, and Fred knelt down next to her and pulled her into a hug, needing something familiar suddenly as he took in the scene around him.

The buildings around the street were made entirely of metal; the metal seemed to be crying, with black streaks flowing down from the window panes and doors, which oddly weren't just on the ground floor, but on the upper floors as well, so that they would open into thin air. One of the buildings had a sign saying "The House" on it, and Fred recalled the man whom he had just encountered talking about the House and taking him there to be "done with". He didn't really want to know what the man meant by "done with", and shuddered as he concentrated on waking a sleepy Daphne from her slumber.

"Daph- Daph, come on, wake up!"

"Uh… Freddy? Why aren't I in bed?"

"Daph, something really weird's happened. I need you to wake up. Come on, wake up, Daph!"

Daphne opened her eyes properly and gasped.

"Freddy- what's happening?"

"I don't know. I don't know what's going on."

Fred gently pulled Daphne up and started walking in the direction of a person walking along the street.

"Excuse me, sir, but where is here?"

The man stared at him.

"You must know where you are? You don't look like nearers, but you must know which state this is?"

Fred shook his head.

"What are nearers?" Daphne asked.

"People who come from this area."

"Locals? Natives?"

"Those aren't words used here, you two. Those are used by the people living in Anglland."

"England?"

"Anglland. The country of the Angllish."

"He must mean England," Fred whispered to Daphne before turning back and asking, "Where is here exactly?"

"This is Ohio. But not your Ohio," a voice said suddenly, cutting in before Fred or the person could have a chance to speak. All three swerved round to see a man standing there, dressed completely in black, with some kind of balaclava over his face and a cane in his hand, which seemed strange as he didn't use it for walking; he just held it, not even touching the ground with it, as though it was a clutch bag or something.

"Fred. Daphne. Come with me. We have some things to discuss."

Blindly, the pair followed, walking away from the bemused man, who sighed and walked on, muttering to himself, "Fred and Daphne? Whatever happened to sensible names like Abrepottic? Common names like those…"

* * *

"Freddy? Daphne?"

Velma called the pair's names softly up the stairs, the sizzling of pancakes behind her and Shaggy and Scooby "minding" them. She had called several times before, but they hadn't come yet and she was a little concerned as to why not.

"Guys?"

Velma pounded up the stairs and looked in on Daphne's room. She was missing, her covers left unmade and no trace of her in the room at all. Velma walked to the next room and opened the door, fully expecting the pair of them to be in there.

At first she smiled when she saw Daphne curled under the duvet, her fingers wrapped around a thread from one of the pillows, but then her eyes fell to the floor and she gasped as she saw Fred slumped on the carpet, his eyes closed. She rushed over and put her fingers under his jaw, taking his pulse and expecting him to react. He didn't. He clearly had no clue she was there.

"Freddy? Freddy, wake up. Come on, Freddy, can you hear me?"

There was still no response. Velma was growing increasingly worried. This wasn't normal or natural.

"Freddy. Freddy, open your eyes, just somehow respond to me…"

She held his hand in hers, lightly slapping his cheek, still talking to him. There was no response.

"Maybe if I get Daph to talk to him," Velma thought, now trembling as she crossed over to the bed and started to shake Daphne, trying to wake her up. It was no use. Daphne was exactly the same.

Velma stared at the two of them for a minute, and then gently knelt down and put Fred in the recovery position, not taking any risks, and hurried out of the room to call an ambulance.

* * *

"Welcome to Ohio number two," the man said as Fred and Daphne sat opposite him in a booth of what looked slightly like a Wild West-style saloon but was very metallic and sharp, with no wood in sight except for a wooden pipe poking out of a customer's mouth. Fred opened his mouth to speak, but the man shook his head and pointed towards a waitress hanging round the next table, who ordered some meal neither Fred nor Daphne had ever heard of before and walked off.

"This is not your Ohio," the man said again, and this time allowed Fred to speak.

"Where are we then? What happened? The moon vanished, and then we were here. Why are we here and what do you mean exactly?"

"This is an alternate universe."

Daphne gasped and reached up to grab Fred's ascot, a habit she had developed recently when she was shocked or scared and wanted to hold him close to her and not one that he minded especially but certainly one that carried a risk of strangulation for him.

"And why are we here in this alternate universe? And what's happening back at home?"

Thankfully for the pair, the man answered both questions precisely.

"You are here because you saw the night sky of this town from your own window, in what is called an inter-dimension visual portal, or IDVP for short. And you, back at home, appear to be in some sort of coma, but your brain activity is the activity happening in your brains now as you talk with me."

"How long are we here?"

"As long as it takes for you to find another IDVP," the man said vaguely. Daphne gasped.

"But we might never find it!"

"I will be helping you. I am a traveller between the two universes. There are several others apart from those two, but these are the two main ones and yours is the dominant universe because it is the one with the most mana."

"So where do we look for the IDVPs?" Daphne asked.

"Around. Look to the north for the nearest one. They move over a range of a few kilometres but are always in the same area. I will arrange for you to be given shelter at the local staying-house, or as you would call it, hotel, free of charge. But beware; there are people in this world who want to find you, and keep you here to make this the dominant universe, and they may be all too familiar."

"Huh? I thought we were the only people from our world here?" Fred asked, his brows drawing together in confusion.

"You are. But that does not mean that other people from your world are not replicated in this one. I will ask a waitress- or, as we call them, food-wish-taker- to give you directions to the staying-house as soon as you are done here. Meanwhile, I suggest you have some food. It's good food, and if you order the sawakhilli, then you'll recognise it. It's what you'd call pasta."

"OK. Thanks."

The man smiled at them and left, already thinking of ways to help them get back and ways to foil those who wanted them to stay.

* * *

The ward was small, with only six or seven beds, two of which Mystery Inc.'s remaining members were not sat around, watching the occupants. Fred and Daphne had been taken to hospital together and were essentially, the gang had been told, comatose.

"We'll wait for them to snap out of it; until then, we'll have to feed them through drips and put them on ventilators to ensure that their breathing isn't affected, as it sometimes is by this kind of condition," the doctor had told the three gently. Velma fought back tears as she watched Scooby gently nuzzling Fred's hand and whining.

"They'll come back," she whispered to Scooby, putting her hand on his back and stroking him. "They will."


	3. Beginning and Visiting Home

The small room in which Fred and Daphne were due to be housed was bland and plain to anyone from that world, but to the pair it was amazingly different to anything they had seen before. The double bed that they would have to share (they had done it before, but only under sufferance) was a circle, and they soon learnt from watching people in the staying-house that they slept curled round and on their sides. It stood in the middle of the room, and at the side was a desk with only one leg which stretched from one side to the other and a wardrobe, which was circular like the bed and attached to the wall, with three different compartments and one place to hang dresses and such. There was no chair for the desk; apparently people did most things standing up.

The pair were too tired to really take the room in. Fred fell asleep on contact with the bed, his breathing becoming deep and assured and different enough to his normal breathing for Daphne to know that he was out. When she curled up next to him and rested her head on his chest, listening fondly to the steady, rumbling drum beat of his heart, he didn't even stir. She fell asleep shortly afterwards, resting her head on his stomach as she moved down the bed slightly.

Quiet reigned in the room for a minute as the two slept, their breathing synchronised and their bodies entwined, but a slight creak from the rusty hinges of the door knifed the silence.

The door was carefully only pushed open a fraction, and half a face peered in, the eyes dark and dull in the almost non-existent light in the room. Most of the face was covered by a cloth wound round the person's skull; only the eyes were free to roam and glance and take in the sights around them. Had the pair woken up at that point, they would have been in for a nasty surprise; as it was they slept on.

The person slid into the room, their feet feather-light on the metal floor, taking in the two slumbering teenagers slowly and carefully. Then- for some reason only known to themselves- they crept back out again and shut the door carefully.

Daphne heard the slap of rubber on metal going down the corridor and opened her eyes briefly, intending to wake Fred up if something was going on. She looked up at him and smiled as she saw that his index finger rested gently on his mouth, making him look about five years younger.

The rubber sounds faded.

_It was probably someone walking along to their own room or something, _Daphne told herself firmly as she snuggled back down, burying her forehead in Fred's stomach again (it was soft enough and nicely warmed-up) and closing her eyes again.

* * *

"Hold his mouth open, please."

The voice wasn't one Fred had heard before, and it didn't sound like one of his relatives or one of his friend's relatives or anyone he had come across before; it was a completely alien voice. He tried to open his eyes, but it was as though he was stuck in limbo inside his body and it didn't respond at all. A hand gently pulled his jaw down as someone prepared something to go inside it.

"Rill Reddy re rokay?" a voice asked, and Fred would have smiled had he not been unable to; Scooby was standing right next to him.

"He'll be fine, we hope," Velma's voice said, and Scooby whined.

Something plastic, something tasting of some sort of foul chemical, was pushed into Fred's mouth, into his throat, his windpipe, and he struggled to breathe for a second before his lungs relaxed somehow and began breathing, but not due to the signals from his brain; they were working independently of him, bending to the will of some machine somewhere.

_I've seen this in medical dramas, probably, _Fred thought wildly, remembering the medical dramas Daphne always seemed to watch on TV when she wasn't watching her fashion shows and catwalks.

He winced inside as a pain began in his chest, spreading slowly over his torso, aching and dull and making him want to pull whatever was in his windpipe out as soon as he could…

* * *

"Ow!"

Fred opened his eyes and realised, as soon as he had, that the pain was gone. He looked round and saw Daphne curled up in a little ball, resting her head on his stomach, sucking her thumb daintily. He was back in the staying-house room, lying in the circular bed with his vest and shorts on. Daphne was in her vest and knickers, and he smiled as she shifted slightly to rest her head uncomfortably on the softer part of his stomach.

"Ow…" he murmured again as her hand prodded his side, and she opened her eyes and looked up at him.

"Sorry," she murmured, taking her hand away and putting it by her side instead. Fred reached down and took it in both of his hands, smoothing his thumb over it and smiling at her. She pushed herself up to lie next to him and burrowed her head into the gap between his shoulder and neck, closing her eyes again.

"Night, Freddy."

"Night, Daph."

She fell asleep within seconds, but however much he tried, Fred couldn't drop off again; he was too busy thinking about what had just happened.

Had he just been back in his own world again, for a short time? If so, he was in hospital, and bad enough to be on some sort of monitor. Making a mental note to ask Daphne what it might have been, he carried on thinking about it.

Maybe it had been a dream. His instincts had told him that was no dream, that was the real world. If it was- and he was pretty certain that he was right- then Daphne would be in the same position too, and Velma and Shaggy and Scooby were with them, probably worried sick. He swallowed a ball of guilt in his throat and sighed.

They needed to get out of here.

"We start tomorrow," he whispered to himself, putting his arms round Daphne and snuggling against her, her elbow pressing into his forearm slightly but not hurting. "We have to get back. So we start tomorrow."

* * *

Velma leaned her head against her hands wearily and sighed. Why had she had the impression that morning, briefly, just briefly, that Fred had been somehow awake when they had been putting the ventilator in?

She had been researching what kind of coma her friends might be in, and why they had suddenly become comatose; fine one day, dead to the world the next. Their brain activity was normal, their reflexes and such were gone. Shaggy had punched Fred full in the stomach to try and get him to wake up, creating the biggest bruise Velma had ever seen, and he hadn't flinched. There had been no movement at all. Just his breathing carrying on, slow and steady.

"Reasons for going into a coma" went into the Google search box. She pressed enter and watched as several different sites came up on her laptop. One site was more helpful, listing several different reasons why a person might go into a coma and giving examples and references from other websites. As far as Velma could see, there was nothing, unless both of her friends had had some kind of accident or something and not told her. There was also the fact that they had gone into the coma at the same time, and were showing the same symptoms and the same brain activity. It was eerie and intriguing and almost scary at the same time. Velma didn't know what to think.

Shaggy sloped down the steps, Scooby close on his heels and carrying something. Velma turned round and clocked what it was.

"Daph had this in her hand, like, when she collapsed."

Velma took it. It was a little note, which said, in spidery handwriting that didn't belong to any of the gang, "Be back soon- you hope". It made almost no sense at all, but it was a clue and Velma placed it beside her computer screen, which the boys were now looking at.

"I can't see anything there that would explain this, I'm sorry," Velma said quietly, putting her hand on Shaggy's shoulder. Shaggy pulled her into a hug and rested his head on hers, feeling her scalp under his small beard and rubbing her back with both hands. Velma pulled herself together as quickly as she could and felt Shaggy guiding her into the lounge and putting her down on the sofa, lying down next to her and closing his eyes. Within seconds he was asleep.

Velma leaned over, pressed her lips to his and felt him respond sleepily. She giggled and lay down as well, winding his arms round her and smiling as she fell asleep too.

The worry was still there, but ever since she had seen the note something had changed inside her. They would be back. Someday.

That was her last thought before she lost consciousness completely.

* * *

"Come on, Freddy, sweetie," Daphne murmured to the dozing boy still lying on the bed as she pulled her clothes on, about to yank the duvet off as she remembered how Mrs Jones used to wake him up. Fred responded with a sleepy moan and she took hold and yanked at the soft cloth, pulling it off her boyfriend and putting it down next to the bed as Fred looked up and narrowed his eyes at her.

"It's cold!"

"Get dressed, then."

_He's cute in the clothes he's got on, though… _she thought as he stretched, yawning widely, and pushed himself up as he rubbed sleep out of his eyes.

"What's the plan for today?"

Fred smiled slightly, turning his head and looking straight into Daphne's eyes.

"I've got to tell you something that happened last night first. Then we're going to go and look for one of these IDVPs."

Daphne nodded, smiling at him, and walked over to treat him to a good-morning kiss.

Unseen to both of them, a shadow moved past the door, having been listening to the whole conversation.

* * *

A/N: I'm not sure how this parallel universe is going… please tell me if you think it's not going so well, the description of the second Ohio. And please review anyway! Thanks to Angel1008, Swamp Fairy, Scoobyfan1, thebieberbabe and everyone else who's reviewed, and Jazzola numero uno fan- thank you for all the support, as always! Jazzola :)


	4. The North Beckons

"Breakfast?"

Fred and Daphne had just arrived down in the breakfast room, which was small and claustrophobic with sheer metal walls and ugly pictures hanging on the expanses of grey. It smelled of strange food, a slightly crazy mixture of korma curry and treacle tart, but the other people around them were friendly and not intrusive, smiling at the pair but not talking to them. Not many people did talk with others.

A large woman with hair done outrageously high pulled out a chair for Fred and let Daphne do it for herself, smiling at them both completely normally. Looking round, everyone else seemed to be doing the same thing, so the pair assumed it was normal and ordered some food.

As the pair ate, in silence, Fred was thinking about how they were going to find this portal and Daphne was thinking of home. Fred had told her about what had happened to him the night before and she had been a little creeped out by his description of what had happened.

"Are you sure we were in hospital?" she had asked him as they walked slowly down to the breakfast room.

"Certain. They were putting something in me, I don't know what it was but it sort of took over my breathing."

"A ventilator. So they think we can't breathe independently. Anything else?"

"Drips, to feed us. And the guys were there as well. Scooby was really upset, crying and stuff, and Velms was trying to help him and Shag but she sounded pretty close to tears as well-"

Fred had broken off abruptly as he felt tears forming in his own eyes and his voice cracking, looking down at the hideous metal flooring. There seemed to be very little wood in this world; everything was this stern grey metal, similar to aluminium and obviously hard-wearing and plentiful. Fred had made the observation in his head to stop himself bursting into tears.

"Freddy? If you want to cry, cry. I'm not gonna tease you," Daphne had said softly, hearing his voice cracking and grasping his hand, bending her own head to let him see the tears in her eyes. Fred had smiled bravely at her and wiped away the glistening moisture from his face, allowing her to see the tears but making sure that she knew they were gone. They had carried on to the breakfast room in a companionable silence.

Now they sat together, each wrapped up in their own thoughts, moodily stirring their food with the strange one-pronged forks that people ate with in this world, their joint goal seeming distant and almost unreachable.

An alarm jolted both out of their reveries and they looked round, startled. All across the room, people were standing up and grabbing bags and such, walking towards the exit.

"Do you wish to be cremated?" one man called back at the pair as they sat motionless, wondering what was going on. "That's the fire siren. Move or you'll be burnt alive in this place."

Fred and Daphne leapt to their feet, rushing out after the other people to see them staring at the flames licking the roof of the staying-house.

"Cooking the breakfast?" one woman asked as a fire truck arrived. At least, it seemed to be a fire truck; it was a horse-pulled chariot-style vehicle with a huge container full of water and some kind of pump attached to the back and being pulled along. Several burly men and women were riding the front of the chariot, and one man was on one of the horses as well, steering until they drew up outside the staying-house and rushed in to deal with the rampaging flames.

Fred quickly drew Daphne aside as the fire was being neutralised.

"Daph- do you think this might be something to do with us? That guy said there are people who want to kill us or find us or something and we have to be on our guard. Something tells me this isn't coincidence."

Daphne thought for a second, frowning, her arms round Fred's waist as he held her close as well, closing his eyes for a second as the flames poured out of an upstairs window and trying not to think of what a close call they had had. If that fire had happened half an hour earlier, they would have been burnt alive.

"Something tells me you're right, but who wants us and why do they want us so bad? Why can't they let us leave and try to get home in peace?"

"The guy said something about the worlds being dominant over each other or something… I don't know the ins and outs of it all, Daph, but they want us and that's what we need to concentrate on."

Daphne nodded and turned as a fireman walked up to them, his face shiny and sweaty and his thick clothing covered in ash and black flakes that might have come from the metal that everything seemed to be made out of.

"The fire was set on purpose at the rear of the building. This is fire-setting and it is a crime. Did you see anyone?"

Fred and Daphne shook their heads in unison.

"OK. The staying-house will have to be demolished, the main structure is all but destroyed. Thanks for your time."

The man walked off to help extinguish the last few lingering flames and Daphne looked up at Fred, then swerved sharply as something- or maybe someone?- caught her eye.

"Freddy. That guy- he's over there."

Fred turned as well, and clocked the man standing in the shadows, with someone else at his side and beckoning them over.

"Come on, but quietly," Fred murmured to Daphne, and she nodded and followed him as they walked towards the pair.

* * *

Velma sighed as she ate a muesli bar from a vending machine in the corridor and saw Shaggy and Scooby coming back in with what looked like half the food supplies of the hospital.

"Guys…"

"Like, it's comfort-eating," Shaggy said, with only half a smile. Velma allowed him to carry on eating, but swiped a chocolate and orange bar from one of the packets for herself and chomped on it as they waited for the doctor to return with the results of several tests they were running on Fred and Daphne.

The hospital-blue swing doors remained motionless and Velma fell slightly into the comfort-eating trap as well, her anxiety and impatience and icy anticipation sharpening her appetite and making her suddenly ravenous.

Shaggy, on the other hand, almost seemed to be savouring his food; he barely ate at half his normal speed, and Velma could feel concern rising in her as she clocked his slow munching.

"Shag?"

"Like, yeah?"

"Are you OK? You're eating really slowly today."

"Like, nervous… What if they're, like, never gonna wake up?"

Velma threw down the Boost bar she was munching and rushed across to hug him, feeling him leaning against her and squeezing his eyes shut to stop the tears coming.

"Shaggy, don't ever think that. Of course they're coming back."

Shaggy nuzzled his head against her chest and tried his best to stop crying. Velma put both arms round him gently, squeezing him and pressing her lips to the crown of his head, and slowly Shaggy seemed to calm down a little, smiling almost shyly at her and holding her back. Scooby just winked at his friends and avoided a muesli bar thrown at his head, then picked it up and ate it.

"Like, how do you know, anyway?" Shaggy asked gently, picking up a chocolate bar and ripping the wrapper off but his eyes on Velma.

"I just do. I don't know how. But just trust me, Shag."

"Oh, like, don't worry," Shaggy said gently, smiling at her. "I already do."

* * *

Fred gently helped Daphne onto the wagon they had hired as a friendly fireman put the bag containing their belongings on the back and made sure the reins were tight and taut and the horses were in good condition.

The man had taken them aside and quietly explained what they needed to do next.

"This is Amirira," he had said, motioning to the girl standing next to him, who had given them a small smile and then had focused on her feet again. "She is our inside spy, and she has confirmed that the Domination Group, the people who are looking to make this the dominant universe and enable us to take control over other universes, know of your presence here and are searching for you. You are no longer safe in this Ohio, and now is the time to leave and find the portal back home. I have gotten you a wagon and horses, and a bag to make out you have possessions; it contains food and water for your journey, as I believe you may have been deprived of your breakfast. I wish you a safe journey, and I will not rest until you are back home. Terrible things will happen if this universe defies the way things should be and becomes the dominant one; it is going against the very material of nature." The pair had agreed and were now getting ready to travel, the wagon standing just outside the burnt-out staying-house and the square in turmoil due to the evacuations of nearby buildings.

"Thanks," Fred said, turning and smiling at the helpful fireman and not noticing as Daphne suddenly grasped her chest, leaning back and giving a little gasp as she began to choke on something that wasn't there.

"No problem," the fireman called back, and Fred turned and gasped himself as he saw Daphne.

"Daph? Daph, sweetie, you OK?"

Daphne shook her head, the colour draining from her face. Fred reached out and gently rubbed her back, trying to ease her breathing, and gradually Daphne returned to normal, leaning against him and clutching his hand.

"What happened?" Fred asked her gently, taking up the reins with his free hand but his other still on Daphne's back. Daphne shook her head.

"I don't know… I just felt awful suddenly, as though something was blocking my wind pipe, and then it got worse and worse and then you started rubbing my back and it helped as well but it felt like someone was taking it out."

Fred put his arm right round Daphne and held her close.

"You're OK now." He lowered his voice. "Maybe they were doing something to you back home, we're in hospital there, remember?"

Daphne nodded and leaned against him once more as he flicked the reins and the horses began moving forwards, towards the north where the pair had been promised their return to their own world.

From the shadows, two dark eyes watched as the pair drove off, and flashed at the horses.

"They are here from the dominant universe… they will have to die to trap their mana here… I will contact the masters."

The person turned and walked towards the grubby little passageway away from the staying-house and the few small buildings around it.

The north beckoned- but, as of then, so did mortal danger.

* * *

A/N: Sorry for the delay in updating, only I have been revising and such for ages and these GCSEs (exams) are hard work… Anyway, it's up now. Please review and tell me what you think! Jazzola :)


	5. Brethren Worlds Apart

Daphne had fallen asleep on Fred's shoulder, one of the axels on the wagon had become wonky, the food was being squashed under a plank of wood that had fallen on it and become wedged and would have to be pulled off at the next stop, the horses were growing tired and Fred's legs had fallen asleep, but he didn't want to stop yet. The light and hum of the second Ohio was still too close for comfort and Fred wanted to get as far away from it as possible before searching for the IDVPs, mindful of the people who were searching for him and Daphne. He shuddered as he thought of them being hunted and urged the exhausted horses onwards a little further as he saw the small staying-house the man had told him about.

"Come on guys, I'm really sorry," he murmured to them, reaching out and patting the rump of the nearest horse gently. Daphne murmured something as she shifted to rest her head more firmly on his shoulder, her lips pressed against his neck and gently nuzzling his skin as she breathed. Fred smiled and laid her back slightly, wiping her lip gloss off his neck and watching as the staying-house approached them.

"Are you staying for the night? The young lady looks very tired," the owner of the staying-house commented, motioning to Daphne, whom Fred had carried in and who was now yawning in his arms. Fred nodded and the owner turned and plucked a key from the board behind him, handing it over and pointing up the stairs. Fred thanked him and walked up with Daphne clutching his arms sleepily and resting her head on his chest.

"You gonna sleep as you are, Daph?" Fred murmured to her, putting her down on the bed and turning away to take his shirt off. Daphne put her hand out and grabbed the hem of his shirt, and he turned with a questioning look on his face.

"Freddy… I feel… cold."

Fred abandoned taking the shirt off and hurriedly sat down next to her, putting his wrist to her forehead and feeling her temperature. She was clammy, freezing under his warm skin, but as soon as he took his hand away she opened her eyes and her skin returned to normal.

"What was that?"

"I don't know," Fred replied softly, gathering her up in his arms and pressing his lips against her cheek to soothe her. She wrapped her arms round his neck and leaned against him, feeling his warmth against her body, as she fell asleep.

"Night, Daph," Fred murmured, lying her down on the bed and turning away again, catching sight of himself in the mirror. He had huge black bags under his eyes, his skin looked rough and bristles covered his chin. He narrowed his eyes at his reflection and looked away from it.

"You're handsome enough as you are," Daphne teased sleepily from the bed, and Fred smiled at her and untied his ascot. The humble little piece of orange fabric hung from his hand, and he smiled at it and the memories that accompanied it as he put it on top of his clothing and lay down to sleep.

_I need some shut-eye so bad, _he thought as his eyes closed and he fell asleep, with Daphne resting her head an inch away from his and her breath brushing his collar and neck.

* * *

Outside the room, an argument was beginning with the owner of the staying-house.

"I want you to tell me if they are here, honourable," a young man said, leaning on the wall of the foyer and glaring at the staying-house owner with piercing blue eyes. The owner shook his head firmly.

"I cannot tell you, honourable. It goes against the Staying-House Code."

"I am telling you now, honourable, if you do not tell me whether they are staying or not then I will… take matters further than I intended."

"Why, what do you intend to do to me?" the man asked, a slight hint of amusement in his voice as he turned away and pressed a button to call a waiter. The young man smiled and pulled a gun from his pocket.

The owner's face changed from its usual ruddy, cheerful red to aghast white in a few seconds; his hands first dropped to his sides in shock, and then slowly and shakily lifted above his head in a show of submission.

"Tell me," the young man said softly. "Tell me if they are here. If I find you lied to me, then I will kill you. I can tell when people lie; there is no escape, _honourable._"

He stressed the man's title cruelly, and the owner quivered harder as the gun was raised to his head level.

"Alright, alright! Don't shoot me, please, honourable!"

"Where are they?" the young man whispered, drawing closer to the terrified staying-house owner.

"In room 14. The young man and girl who just arrived."

"Good."

The man turned away, still holding the gun to his victim's head, and pulled a spare set of keys for the room from a rack.

"Oh, and by the way, it's no use calling the correctors," he added with a sinister hint to his voice. "They won't get here in time. I'll be long gone by then… in fact, in another universe completely. So, as we may well not meet again until eternal glory is mine… my name is Mitchell Jones."

The young man cocked the gun, stowed it in his belt, smiled at the staying-house owner and turned to run up the stairs.

The owner, still almost petrified with fear, reached over to the hatch and grasped a button there, with "CORRECTORS" written underneath it.

He had no idea that it was far too late for them.

* * *

Mitchell Jones panted up the stairs, his emotions mixed. He knew from what he had been told by Rileyson back at headquarters that these two were dating, from the dominant universe and- most importantly for Mitchell- that in the dominant universe, the boy was his brother. He had sworn to himself that he would feel no emotion for him- he was a scoundrel, he had no right being here from his inferior world- but he couldn't help wondering what he was like, how he looked, what his life was like in his universe. Maybe it was better than this one? No.

"Stop that, you fool," he hissed to himself as he reached out and opened the door, the key sliding out of the door almost as soon as it had gone in. If you wanted to be in this organisation, you had to learn to open doors silently and quickly.

His heart thudded silently as he took in the sight of the two people sleeping on the bed, the girl curled around the young man whose features Mitchell was now studying keenly.

There was a resemblance between the two men; the subtle jaw, the smooth curve of the cheekbones, the pale lips, the thick, curved hair. They seemed similar in some ways, and worlds apart in others, literally. His hand was in the hand of his girlfriend, a pretty specimen, long curly red hair and a gorgeous dainty face, enhanced by the perfect make-up on the eyes and lips and cheeks. The make-up she had been wearing when she had come out here would have stayed in place no matter what in this world; it was a lucky break for her that she had forgotten to take her make-up off before going to sleep and it hadn't been mussed by the pillow. The pile of clothes on the chair beside the bed was messy, the sign of a tired man just wanting to get to sleep. Mitchell reckoned he was completely out.

"You're coming with me," he murmured, but with none of the sinister voice he had used downstairs. Although this was what he had trained for, worked for, hoped for for so long, suddenly it seemed so… violent. Evil. Unneeded. Unjust.

Throwing the thoughts out of his head, Mitchell walked over to the bed and silently, gently, tied ropes round the wrists and ankles of the occupants, making sure that his touch didn't wake them up and trying to banish the growing feelings in his stomach telling him to stop.

Mitchell had never been this unsure.

* * *

"Nothing happened today?" Velma asked as a nurse walked in. She shook her head.

"Nothing, I'm afraid. We tried using cold shocks on both, but Daphne's response was disappointing and Fred didn't react at all. I doubt he felt a thing."

Velma nodded in understanding and explained what she meant to Shaggy and Scooby after the nurse had gone, talking about temperature shocks sometimes triggering a response from people in comas.

"Ran I risit?" Scooby asked as the nurse came back, and Shaggy translated.

"Sure," the young woman shrugged, turning and opening the curtain to let the three into the bed bay. Velma walked in first, walking over and putting her hand on top of Fred's briefly, hoping he might respond. Nothing happened, but when she grasped Daphne's hand her eyes flickered.

"Daph?" Velma asked, leaning forwards and encouraging her to wake up. Nothing happened.

"She's gone again," Velma said quietly, sitting down in between her friends. Scooby nuzzled Daphne's hand and then moved over to the other bed, looking down into Fred's expressionless face and carefully avoiding the ventilator secured into his mouth as he did so. He whined softly and sat down next to them instead, watching the machines monitoring pulse, oxygen, vital life statistics.

"They'll come back," Velma said comfortingly. Shaggy reached forwards and put his hand on the mattress just next to Fred's arm and pushed it down: it always worked when he was trying to wake Fred up at home, but it didn't make any difference at all here.

"Like, I sure hope you're right, Velms."

Velma put her arm round him and watched as a nurse walked in and injected something into Fred's arm. Shaggy winced and Velma bit her lip as a bead of bright blood came out of the small puncture, but Fred didn't seem to notice a thing…

* * *

"Ow!"

Fred opened his eyes as a sharp jab of pain in his arm woke him up. At first he thought Scooby had pricked him with a claw, but when he looked round he saw what had actually happened.

He was hidden under a pile of cloths, tied up, on the back of a wagon.

Fred's first instinct was to look for Daphne, and there she was, sleeping soundly next to him, also tied up. He wished he could wake her up, but realised that someone was sitting nearby and, thankful that his exclamation before hadn't woken them up, decided to let her sleep.

Craning his neck, Fred managed to look out and see the ground flashing by under his body. He seemed to be on some sort of mud track, the kind you got in cowboy films, and the jogging motion of the wagon made him feel vaguely sea-sick. He closed his eyes briefly and tried to remember what he had been thinking about a second before. Something about Scooby and Shaggy pressing on his mattress as he slept…

The memory evaded him, and he gave up.

Daphne gave a sleepy moan and turned over, meeting Fred's eyes as hers opened. Fred shook his head at her gently, motioning to their surroundings, and Daphne frowned and then groaned as she looked round.

Due to their experience in mysteries and needing to lip-read, both were pretty good at it, and since it was the only method of communication that was sure not to result in their immediate discovery and probably deaths they began using it.

"Where are we going?"

"I don't know. North, I think."

"North? To the IDVPs?"

"Yeah. I think the organisation found us, Daph."

"Freddy… Oh no, we're gonna die…"

"Ssh, Daph, don't think that."

"I don't think it, I know it."

"Daph. Don't. We are gonna get out of this, and together."

"You promise?"

"I promise. I love you."

"I love you too," Daphne whispered.

But as the wagon went over a bump and the two were thrown about uncomfortably, they began to wonder if anyone else in this world cared about them.

* * *

A/N: I'm sorry it took so long, I've had exams (Ethics and Philosophy- avoid at all costs, peoples) and writer's block as well… Please review, and a huge thanks to everyone who's already review! You rock! Jazzola :)


	6. Captured!

The wagon carried on bumping and jerking along the mud road, and Fred could feel his body gradually becoming covered with bruises. He smiled and then grimaced at the thought of what his friends would be thinking if the bruises appeared on his body in the hospital at home, but guessed they wouldn't, since he didn't have any marks on his body here from what they were doing to him at home. To avoid bumping into Daphne constantly, he had wrapped his arms round her and now held her close, her head resting against the crook of his neck, as the journey carried on and on and on.

Eventually, the wagon stopped and a voice filtered through the cloths on the wagon into Fred's ears.

"Are they in there?"

"Yes," came a harsh voice from the front of the wagon, and Fred frowned; where had he heard that name before?

"Bring them in, then. We will have to use the methods on them; the room will need soundproofing. Female screams in particular are very piercing and easy to hear."

Fred gulped slightly and tightened his grip round Daphne. She had woken up a few minutes earlier, but hadn't yet opened her eyes, and at the feel of him holding her tighter she looked up at him and made eye contact.

"We're gonna be OK," she mouthed to him, seeing the uncharacteristic fright in his eyes, and he gave her a small and unsure smile as the cloths were yanked away from over them and they were hauled out with rough arms and minimal care taken not to hurt them.

"These the pair, Mitchell?" someone asked, and the driver nodded. Fred gasped as it fell into place, and as he was pulled round he caught a glimpse of the driver.

His brother sat there, or at least a man who looked too similar to his brother to be coincidence, a carbon copy of the Mitchell Fred knew, and Fred could feel his head and stomach starting to swirl as he and Daphne were hauled off to inside some building.

Daphne began crying as soon as they were inside, her sobs of fright echoing off the walls. Fred reached over and grasped her hand as the ropes were untied and they were put in some room with bars all around it, making both feel like animals in a zoo but at least now sitting down and not jerking around in a cart.

"Ssh, Daph, it's OK," Fred whispered, letting her nuzzle into his chest and sob onto his shirt. He put his arms round her and held her close, his chin resting on her head as she gasped, but his thoughts strayed to the man who seemed to be some sort of equivalent of his own brother.

He would have thought that Mitchell would be working with them, rather than against them, and the- betrayal?- sliced through him darkly, raising his pulse and clenching his fists as he held Daphne still. She sobbed and cried and hiccupped into his shirt, feeling his warm skin next to her, and tried to stop crying, but instead of stopping her crying stepped up a notch and she started wailing, howling and not caring that the people around her could hear her; only Fred mattered to her now, and she knew he didn't mind.

"You, shut up, now," a man hissed from outside of the cage, pointing to Daphne. She shook her head, holding Fred tightly and feeling him stroke her hair, his mind diverted from the Mitchell-clone in this world to her at the sound of her crying.

"Shut up or I'll make you shut up!" the man threatened heatedly, raising a huge fist and pressing it against the bars, right into Daphne's face. Daphne continued sobbing, a bubble of emotion pressing against her chest and making it impossible for her to stop crying.

"Alright then…"

The man yanked his key ring from his pocket, opened the door of the cage and grabbed Daphne, pulling her head forwards and punching her in the back of the neck. She fell onto the floor of the cage, her shrieking stopping abruptly as she lost consciousness.

"Daph!" Fred gasped, rushing forwards and grabbing her hand. He looked up at the tyrannical man towering above him and narrowed his eyes.

"You'll pay for that…"

Fred leapt up and grabbed the guy round the neck, pulling him into a headlock, and the man roared and tried to pull him off. Several more men and women rushed in, and together managed to pull Fred off, whom normally would have been flattened by the huge hulk of a man he had picked a fight with but who was now fuelled by blind rage which made him fight like a cornered wildcat, swift and fierce.

"I want him down as well," the man growled, pointing at Fred as he got his breath back and massaged his neck slightly. One of the women holding Fred back reached into her bag and pulled out some sort of dart-like object.

"Hold him nice and still."

Hearing the words and the sinister tone in which they had been said, Fred writhed even more in the arms of his aggressors, but it was to no avail and the needle of the dart pierced his forearm and began draining something into it. Still fighting, Fred could feel his arm growing steadily weaker and tried to jerk the needle out of it, but before he could the full contents of the dart drained into his bloodstream and he fell into unconsciousness, unable to resist the sedating effects of the chemical.

"Good," the man said softly as the group of assorted people laid Fred down next to Daphne and the woman reached down to pull the dart out from his forearm. The small, puckered wound was bleeding, and the man bent down and wiped a little blood onto his own fingers, smiling as he did so.

"He will have lost more than a little blood once we are finished with him. Come, we have more work to do and we need to carry on with the plans. These two are out now."

Nodding and responding quietly, the group walked away, leaving both Fred and Daphne unconscious on the floor of the cage.

* * *

"Very restless today," Velma murmured as she saw Fred's hand tighten round the drip lead feeding him. She gently untangled it and put her hand on his forehead, wondering if he had caught some infection or some illness. His temperature was completely normal.

"Ris Reddy rill?" Scooby asked softly, walking over. Velma frowned, shaking her head but her brain still whirring so hard that Scooby could almost hear the cogs grinding against each other. Then again, with Velma's love of computers she would probably have a motherboard in there instead.

"Just… very active somehow. Don't ask me, Scoob."

Scooby nuzzled Fred's hand and smiled as one finger reached up, seemingly unprompted, and stroked his muzzle.

"Reddy!"

Fred didn't seem to respond at all, but Velma looked down at him and once again got the sense that he was awake somehow…

* * *

"Freddy?" Daphne whispered, waking up and slowly remembering all that had happened. She looked round and saw him next to her, his arm scarred with rivers of blood from a puncture wound on his forearm. She rubbed the scarlet away gently.

"Freddy, sweetie, can you hear me?"

He didn't respond, and Daphne simply lay down next to him and curled herself round his body. He was slumped awkwardly, and Daphne guessed he hadn't lain down there himself, he had been lowered there or forced there.

After a while she whispered "I'll wait for you to wake up, then," and reached out to stroke his hair, taking his hand in hers. He whispered something that she didn't quite catch, but which might have been her name.

"I'm here," she murmured, turning his head to open his eyelids gently with her fingers. His eyes were empty, cold, asleep. Daphne shivered and closed them again.

"He's not gonna wake up, child."

Daphne swerved hastily round to see the man who had knocked her out, narrowing her eyes as he moved closer.

"Crushed mazzivarus bark. A very powerful sedative; they use it in hospitals. He's asleep for at least another half an hour, I'm afraid."

He grinned as he said it, and Daphne bit back a rude remark, afraid of him and how powerful he was but hating him with all her heart. Fred squeezed her hand gently and she turned, only half pretending not to be able to look at him any more (except not due to fright, due to hatred) and whispered to him, "Are you awake?"

He gave the smallest possible of nods, and Daphne smiled and whispered back, "Keep your eyes closed and pretend to be sleeping" before turning to the hulk-like person standing nearby and glaring at him.

"Could I have some privacy, please? I want to check Freddy over, he had an accident at the hotel, and I don't want you watching as I do it."

The excuse, despite being a little desperate and lame, did the job, and the man left.

"Long shot, but it worked," Fred whispered as he sat up, moving his arm and wincing at the pain from the wound in his forearm. Daphne rubbed her fingertips over the puncture, looking him in the eyes and whispering so quietly Fred had to lip-read some of what she was saying.

"I've got a plan, I made it in my head while you were asleep. Are you up for it?"

Fred nodded, not breaking his eye contact with her.

"Anything to get us out of here, Daph."

Daphne nodded and reached up to entwine her fingers into his ascot absent-mindedly as she talked.

"I want you to pretend you're dead. Remember drama class at school? You almost fooled the teacher."

Fred chuckled slightly.

"She was the one who nearly had a heart attack, never mind me."

"So we know you're convincing. They'll take you somewhere else and they won't bother to secure it. You can escape and then I'll pretend to die of grief or something in my sleep. They want us dead anyway so we'll just be playing along. We'll both escape and meet up at the staying-house we stayed at before, and then we'll find the IDVPs and get home. I know it's a long shot, but it'll have to work or we're sunk."

"Don't think that," Fred whispered comfortingly, putting his arms round Daphne and holding her close. He smeared a little blood on her clothes by doing so, but she didn't care; her clothes were in an appalling state anyway. For some reason, even though she had been in her pyjamas when she had come to this world, she was dressed in her normal dress, scarf, tights and shoes when she was there. Fred was the same, except obviously in different clothing.

"Hopefully it'll work, and if it doesn't, we'll just have to think of something else. We will get out of here, Daph. We will."

Daphne gave a small, wet smile and nodded bravely, kissing him on the cheek and jumping as a gravelly voice made its way through from the door.

"Are you finished yet, girl? I am getting impatient!"

"Fine, I'm done," Daphne called back, and Fred hurriedly lay back and pretended to be asleep again as the door opened and the man stomped in, clearly in a bad mood about something.

"They've delayed your execution for some reason," he hissed, walking over and slapping the wall with his palm in anger. "I cannot believe it… still, I will see you dead one day, even though it will be further away from now than I thought."

He turned away, still evidently annoyed about the delay of the deaths he was looking forward to in his savage mind. Daphne gulped and clenched her fists, torn between anger and fear at the sight of his broad, irritable profile.

"It'll be tomorrow then," she whispered, so quietly that Fred only just caught her and the hulk-like man across the room was oblivious. "We'll do it tomorrow."

A squeeze of her hand told Daphne that Fred agreed.

* * *

A/N: I'm sorry I've been so long updating, I have exams still and they are eating away at my free time like bugs eating at rotten fruit… What a lovely analogy… Sorry. Hope you liked the chapter, anyway, and please review! Thank you for bearing with me. Jazzola :)


	7. Playing Possum

The night passed slowly, as neither Fred nor Daphne got any sleep at all. Fred surreptitiously kept practising playing possum, and Daphne rehearsed her lines and tried to think herself into the mindset she would be in if Fred died for real, all the time snuggled in his warm arms and resting her head on his chest. Every time he started rehearsing playing dead, she could feel the steady movement of his chest ceasing to exist and the soft, hot breath coming from his face becoming faint and almost undetectable. It scared her and reassured her at the same time; he was certainly convincing, but it wasn't something she needed to hear right now, the sounds of her boyfriend dying as she lay entwined with him and pretending to be asleep.

Dawn broke, and with it came the large man who had knocked Daphne out the day before and given orders for Fred to be injected with the sedating chemicals. From listening to the quiet conversation he had with another man, they figured that his name was Barrios, but he was called Pound around the building.

"Wakey wakey, sleeping beauties," Pound crooned roughly into the cage as he stomped in, his huge ugly boots crunching on the metal floor and seeming to attack it with each step. Daphne half-opened her eyes and whispered "Freddy?", forgetting momentarily about their plan and panicking for a second as he lay motionless and she shook his shoulder gently. Then it came back to her and she smiled surreptitiously and shook him a little harder.

"Freddy, darling, wake up," she murmured, reciting the lines she had formulated in her head and whispered to herself during the night, seeking Fred's approval. He had made a few suggestions here and there, but most of the job had been Daphne's.

"Freddy? Freddy, come on."

His eyes remained closed, and his breathing gently deflated, becoming shallower and shallower even as she watched; the steady movement of his chest stopped, and she gasped as it did so.

"Freddy! FREDDY!"

Despite Daphne almost blasting his eardrums off, and cursing herself internally for it, Fred did an excellent job of acting dead. Pound yanked the door open roughly and strode round, pulling Fred up and opening one of his eyes, taking no care not to poke Fred in the eye. Daphne winced as his sausage-like finger found its way to Fred's iris and prodded it hard, but Fred's reaction was so minute Pound missed it altogether and Daphne only just caught it.

"Freddy? Please tell me he's going to be OK, oh my goodness, Freddy, no…"

Daphne began sobbing, crying her heart out, and to her immense relief (and Fred's, although he showed no sign) real tears leaked from her baby-blue eyes.

"Freddy… He can't be…"

"Shut up," Pound growled, shaking Fred hard, trying to get some movement from him. There was nothing.

"Get the doctor, I want to see him die like the Organisation wants him to!" Pound yelled at someone, who rushed out of the door and into the corridor.

Daphne rushed forwards and started holding onto Fred, her tears falling onto his shirt and his face and his closed eyes.

But underneath her long red hair, she smiled.

* * *

"Death by natural causes, possibly the accident the other prisoner described. The doctor believes internal bleeding."

Daphne caught her breath; they wouldn't have hurt Fred, would they? She knew all about post-mortems from a school project (it had been Velma's choice of subject, she'd wanted twenty-first century Parisian fashion) and she guessed that they would have had to cut him open to determine internal bleeding. Shuddering at the mental picture that came into her head, Daphne focused back on the people in front of her, who were looking over the report from the doctor and thinking over what to do next.

"We still need to drain his body of mana, we should have done it while he was alive," one man said, and another nodded.

"Excuse me…"

The heads of the people whipped round to look at Daphne, who was standing with shackles on her wrists and ankles, her head bowed as though in sorrow, although under it her eyes were dry.

"Can I… can I go and see… see his body? Please?"

It would be the perfect way to make their getaway. Already Daphne's mind was going over the escape plan, thinking of how best to distract anyone around them, and she smiled beneath her locks as she formulated her plan.

"Why?" Pound growled, standing up. Daphne gave a quick pretend sob.

"We were… we were lovers… we were in love…"

Quietly wondering whether she would class herself and Fred as lovers, she didn't dare to look up. Pound grunted above her and she felt herself being steered towards the room in which they had decided to place Fred's "body", rough hands on her arms and yanking on her chains but taking her to the man she loved.

"You have five minutes," Pound hissed threateningly, unlocking the shackles (they wouldn't fit through the narrow doorway) and pushing her in.

Daphne walked slowly up to the table on which Fred was lying, pressing her hand against his as she drew near him.

"Freddy. It's me."

Fred opened his eyes slowly, adjusting to the light and looking up at her. He was still in his normal clothing, and the only wound on his body seemed to be a sharp, scalpel-style cut on his arm.

"I was beginning to wonder if you were ever going to come."

"Of course I was," Daphne said gently, leaning down to kiss him. Fred pushed himself up with some difficulty, due to his stiff muscles from not moving, and pulled the sheet covering his body off. Daphne caught his arm and had a look at the cut on it.

"Did they make that?"

"Yeah, they thought there was something under my skin. It didn't hurt as much as I thought it would, anyway."

Daphne winced and pulled her scarf off, winding it gently around the cut. Fred sucked his breath in sharply as she tied it and she grasped his hand harder as she did up the knot properly and let his arm fall back to his side.

"There. Now you won't drip blood all over the place and give us away."

"Thanks," Fred murmured. "What's the plan from now?"

"We can get out of that opening there," Daphne whispered, pointing to a canvas flap on the side of the building. The whole place was falling apart, and the flap covered a hole in the wall big enough for both to squeeze through. Nobody had been bothered about it being there when they had put Fred in the room- after all, to them he was dead- and they'd forgotten all about it since.

Making as little noise as possible, Daphne walked over and, with Fred's help, lifted the canvas to let him squeeze through.

Together they ran from the building, heading towards the town, hand in hand and with their mission suddenly seeming much more like reality.

* * *

"Velms! Velma, like, you need to hear this!"

Velma turned as Shaggy pelted down the corridor towards her, his eyes alight with a boyish fire and Scooby hot on his scruffy heels.

"Like, he moved! Properly moved!"

"Freddy?" Velma asked, turning and dropping the money she was holding. Stooping to pick up the dollar bill and grabbing her arm at the same time, Shaggy began dragging her down towards the ward.

"C'mon!"

Velma started hurrying as well, pushing the door to the ward open way too hard and running helter-skelter over to the curtains and past them. She arrived just in time to see Fred's fingers grip a drip lead and hastily pulled them off, putting her hand on his arm and frowning as he winced. Looking down at his arm, she could see no visible wounds.

"Freddy?"

He opened his mouth and looked as though he was trying to say something, but the words refused to come. Velma gently put her hand under his head and lifted it slightly, bringing her own head down and trying to make out what he was saying.

"We escaped… played possum… my arm… scalpel… help me… black… portal… means safe…"

"Freddy?" Velma asked gently, putting her hand on his forehead, gently opening one eye. It didn't focus on her, but it was focused; Velma had no idea what on.

"The north… remember… portals black… black… means… home."

Fred closed his eyes as he murmured the last word, his soft breathing starting up and his face becoming limp and expressionless once again. Velma reached down and tried to open his eyes again, but it was no use; he was dead to the world once again.

"I just wish I knew what he meant," she murmured, sitting down, thinking hard. Normally she would presume this was some sort of crazy dream, brought on by his comatose state, but that just didn't seem right now. Shaggy, beside her, had the same feeling, and Scooby whined and pawed at Shaggy, the same theory inside him.

"Portals… and black means safe… That's the key… black means safe…"

* * *

"Go in, she's had her time," Pound growled, and one of the henchmen standing around the makeshift morgue's door grunted and squeezed in through the slim doorway, wriggling through and swearing like a trooper as he did so.

He stopped swearing abruptly at the sight of the empty room and the canvas flap swinging in the breeze.

"What's happening in there, fool?" Pound roared, grabbing the doorframe and pulling it out of the wall to reveal the figure of the henchman's silhouette behind the dust and the empty room he was stood in.

Pound stood motionless for a moment.

Then he threw back his head and bellowed for all he was worth.

"YOU IDIOTS!" he bawled as several more men came running. "Get after them! GET THEM!"

As the swarm of men trampled the ruined doorway into the metal floor, Pound stood motionless except for his deep breathing, his fists clenched and his face contorted in wrath and loathing.

"They will PAY for this!"

* * *

Fred bent over forwards, gasping as Daphne pulled on his hand, his own hand scrabbling at the stitch in his side. Daphne put her hand on his back and guided him gently behind some old wagons in the scrapyard they were hiding in.

"Come on, sweetie…"

Fred managed to straighten up to clamber over some piles of metal and twisted, charred wooden poles, letting himself fall into the little clearing Daphne had made for them.

"Are you OK?" he asked, panting and rubbing his skin to try and get rid of the stitch. Daphne nodded, leaning against him and listening to his rapid heartbeat, feeling his warmth on her skin and pressing her lips against his damp cheek.

"Are you crying?" she whispered, tipping his head back to see the moisture gathering in his storm-coloured blue eyes. He shook his head just as a tear fell from his eye, and Daphne wiped it away with gentle hands, putting her arms round him and whispering in his ear.

"Come on, Freddy, my darling, we're OK. We got away from them. Next stop is the IDVPs and home!"

Fred sniffed determinedly and nodded, giving Daphne a tremulous smile.

"I know. I'm just… being stupid. Take no notice. You were amazing back there."

"Playing dead while they're cutting your arm open takes guts as well, you know," Daphne reminded him, making sure the bandage was firm and lying back with him, spreading out on the blanket she had scrounged from the town. Fred shrugged.

"That was only a couple of minutes."

"Even so."

Daphne leaned over and pressed her lips against his, feeling him respond gently and his head falling back to lie on the ground, his eyes closing properly. Within a few seconds he had fallen asleep, a glaze of tears still visible on his cheeks. Daphne wiped them away and snuggled down beside him, closing her own eyes and just keeping awake long enough to drape a blanket over the pair of them before she was asleep as well.

* * *

A/N: Sorry I took so long updating, school and such (and plain laziness on my part-sorry!) and I went to the Hay Festival today and met Sophie McKenzie! Oh yeah… I got to interview her! :) Still, please review and let me know if you like what I'm writing! Thanks to ShaggelmaLove for the long and completely random and weird conversation we've been having while I wrote this chapter and also to all my reviewers! Jazzola :)


	8. Plans for the North

"I don't wanna get up…" Fred moaned softly as Daphne pulled the blanket off him and leaned down to roll his sleeve up and check the cut on his arm. "I wanna go back to sleep…"

"Typical man," Daphne replied swiftly, poking him gently in the stomach and putting her hand on his forehead.

"You're not ill, so get up and we'll go and get our stuff. There's a guy who rents wagons a little way away, I've been listening to him talking. Well, yelling. Does he think the rest of the population is deaf or something?"

"When you've finished your rant," Fred grinned, earning himself a careful whack on the arm.

"Get up, _now._"

Fred smiled and pushed himself up, meeting Daphne's eyes and being taken by surprise when she kissed him.

"I thought you were narked with me?"

"I was. But your eyes just made it too hard to stay narked."

"Good. Now I know what to do next time we're in a haunted house or something and you get exasperated with me because I want us to split up."

"Don't take advantage," Daphne laughed, pulling him up and walking round him, casting a critical eye over his clothes. Fred brushed himself down self-consciously and gave her a confused look.

"What are you doing?"

"Freddy, people are going to be suspicious if it looks like we've been sleeping rough, and we're already conspicuous."

"OK. You've got a point."

"As always," Daphne teased, putting her arm round his waist and leaning down to roll up the blankets. Fred crouched down to help her, clumsy with only his right arm but enough help to speed things up. Daphne ripped a strip off one of the blankets to make a new bandage to cover his arm.

"Come on. Have you got any money?"

"I've got some of what that guy gave us, to help us. The people who looked me over didn't find it."

"Enough to get us a wagon to the north?"

"Yeah, enough for a wagon."

"Then follow me."

Daphne turned and walked away from the scrapyard, with Fred on her heels and her face set in determination.

From the shadows, a tall, lanky boy watched, his eyes slits, the light not showing their bottle-green colour and making them look empty, dark, unreal, like black holes. His mouth curved a little into a smile as he slid from pile to pile, and his darkened eyes never left the blond teenager, who looked so much like his companion Mitchell back at HQ, and his girlfriend. He called Mitchell his "companion" because Ruxus didn't have real friends; he found they moved too close to you and made you soften, and Ruxus was proud of his titanium core, as hard as a boulder and as cold as his seemingly inhuman eyes.

"Come on, sweetie," Daphne called back as Fred stumbled momentarily, regaining his balance after a second. Fred nodded and followed her, slipping his arm round her shoulders as they began haggling with the wagon lender. Ruxus didn't know the man, had never even seen him before, but due to his position in the Organisation he already hated the man with venom and pure sting in his eyes as he moved towards him, stealthy and carefully out of the view of the two teens.

Now was the time to strike.

Ruxus moved forwards, pinning the unfortunate man's throat with his arm and knocking him against the wall he stood in front of in one surprise attack. The man couldn't even scream for help.

"Tell me where they went," he said softly.

* * *

"They can't be more than a few miles away from the town and the building; they had nothing on them, no money, nothing to prove who they were, and on top of it all they are clearly not nearers. It won't take long to find them. They'll stick out like a pair of dogs in an alleyway full of cats."

The analogy, however lame, did the trick for wiping some of the anger off Pound's ruddy, darkened face.

"You're right. They'll head for the north immediately, to find the portals that our inside girl keeps going on about, and it'll be easy enough to find them. Good man. Dismissed."

The henchman nodded and turned on his heel, not quite wanting to show his back to the behemoth of muscle and power and anger behind him.

"We will track them down," Pound murmured to himself, reaching out to grab a random man and order for him to bring him some food. The man rushed off, not wanting to incur Pound's wrath.

"We need to start making inquiries. If we get the entire town looking for them it'll be a cinch. Make out that they're criminals; the crime could be something like assault, something nice and serious but not quite murder or such, just something that'll draw people onto them. We want their pictures around town, their identities and descriptions, and then we'll find them as soon as they set foot into the town. They'll have to go back to the town at some point, for supplies and such, and once they go we'll have them."

"Yes, sir," mumbled the man whom Pound had grabbed, returning with a plate of what looked like something a dog would sick up but which Pound devoured hungrily.

"Thank you… just like Mom used to make it," he growled, grinning through his wiry beard as he wiped the last few morsels of food off his face. The man quickly took the plate and hurried away.

"Honourable?"

"What?" Pound barked, swerving round to see one of his closer right-hand men, a lean, tall specimen of a teenager, Ruxus.

"The two have been spotted in the centre of Ohio, hiring a wagon from the dealer on the northern streets. We believe from what we forced from the dealer that they're heading north to find the portals. If we just stay a safe distance behind them and make sure that the wagons are silenced-"

"I'm sorry, Ruxus," Pound snarled, cutting into the teen's eager planning talk with his axe-like growl of a voice. "I was under the impression that I was planning this one, and you were going to help by tracking the kids. Do I look incapable enough that I would turn to you for help?"

Ruxus looked down to stop Pound seeing the flush of anger and frustration on his face.

"No, Honourable."

"Then shut up, you puny little runt, and let the people who know what they're doing handle this."

Ruxus gave a little bow and scuttled away, swearing under his breath.

"So they're heading to the north right now…" Pound muttered to himself, turning to the wall chart of Ohio and the surrounding areas pinned up on the wall next to him. "I feel the North Ohio Plains calling me… This universe will dominate!"

He slammed his fist onto the wall chart and turned to make his demands heard.

Pound had a long journey ahead of him.

* * *

Daphne thrashed out in her sleep, hitting one of the monitors at the edge of her bed and causing it to start caterwauling, summoning three nurses, a doctor and Shaggy, who beckoned for Velma and Scooby from the hallway.

As soon as they were all gathered around the bed, Daphne reached out and her hand found Velma's.

"They're coming… for me… and Freddy… they want… us dead… for their… universe… please… help us… somehow…"

Daphne gave a little sob, a shudder, and was still.

Velma sat down next to her friend, not letting go of her hand, not sure what to make of the announcement she had just made. It sounded like, in her head, she and Fred were in trouble… but then, wasn't it just in her head? Surely it wasn't real? Velma, the sceptic, the rationalist, the scientist, was doubtful on the outside that anything Daphne was currently experiencing was real, but on the inside, something that she couldn't identify, couldn't name, couldn't touch on except for the few seconds when it was talking to her, was telling her that it was somehow, and that this was no normal coma, this was something different, something brought on by an external factor that she didn't know about but would find out about in time.

"Daphne, can you hear me?" Velma asked softly, leaning down and looking into Daphne's expressionless face, watching as Scooby put his paw on Daphne's stomach to try and get a response of some sort. Daphne's eyes stayed closed, but she leaned down and grasped Scooby's paw tightly, as though she was trying to cling on to something to stop herself falling or leaving. Scooby yelped.

"The North Plains… the IDVPs… we have to find them or… we're dead."

She sighed gently and lay still once again.

Shaggy's face turned a little white as he took in his friend, and he turned and looked at Velma for reassurance. Velma smiled at him and reached over to put her arm round his shoulders.

"They'll be OK. I know it. In my heart of hearts. They'll be OK."

Shaggy gave a tired smile and fell asleep on Velma's shoulder, his warm breath tickling her shoulder and his skin warm on hers. She gently put both her arms round him and leaned against him as well, feeling his soft breathing and watching Daphne as she slept on.

The scene swam in front of her eyes, and then disappeared in blackness as she fell asleep as well.

* * *

"Daphne? Daphne, sweetie, are you asleep?"

"Not any more," Daphne groaned faintly, sitting up and taking in where she was. It was night time, and the stars beamed extrovertly in the charcoal sky as the wagon rumbled along over rough ground. She had fallen asleep curled in the back of the wagon, and as she looked up she saw Fred clambering over to lie down next to her.

"Sorry, I was just getting in here too."

He yawned widely, too exhausted to even put his hand up and cover his mouth. Daphne did it for him, smiling as he squinted at her in the darkness and pulled a blanket over to cover himself.

"Night."

He closed his eyes and fell asleep almost immediately, his face bathed in the milky light from the stars and reminding Daphne of that fateful night when they had been brought here. Fred had taken the blame for that, saying he should have listened to her, but Daphne had refused to let him berate himself for it, saying he had always been curious, it was only natural. She sighed and reached out to rest her arm over his waist, enjoying the feeling of his breathing against her hand and finding it slightly reassuring.

As she drifted back to sleep, closing her eyes under the dim light from stars billions of miles away, a figure stole a look at her sleeping profile and gave a small grin.

Ruxus moved closer to the wagon, hiding behind a rock a little way away and keeping his eye on the sturdy wooden planks of the wagon. Wagons were one of the few things the people of this world used wood for, for the simple reason that it held together better, since they had yet to discover welding. Ruxus knew and didn't care. All his thoughts and all his energy were focused on the young couple sleeping soundly in the back of the wagon, closer than Ruxus had ever been to anyone, and further away from home than he had ever been as well.

Ruxus didn't mean that particular fact to stay the same.

With his vision of being named Supreme Ruler, of being worshipped by all the filthy creatures of the now-dominant world, of being powerful beyond current knowledge, ringing in his ears and engraved into his cold eyes, he slept, lightly, keeping watch.


	9. The Countdown Begins

"Daphne, sweetie…"

Daphne opened her eyes to see Fred standing up on the wagon, stretching and looking down at her, his smiling blue eyes shining. She smiled back at him and stood up, wrapping her arms round him and resting her head against his chest as she woke up from what felt like the longest sleep ever. Her hair stood up in spikes on her head, flyaway coating her skull, but for once in her life she barely even cared. Her focus was on the north and the IDVPs and the eagerly-wanted way home and the man she held in her arms.

"We'd better get going," Fred said softly, giving Daphne a squeeze and breaking his hold on her, hiding his reluctance. Daphne saw his eyes flicker back towards her and giggled to herself, quietly cursing and loving his stubbornness at the same time.

The wagon was ready to go quickly, and the horses were woken up, the reins on and the food and water stored within a quarter of an hour; Daphne timed them on Fred's dusty watch, hoping they weren't losing too much time, and breathed a sigh of relief once they were going again, resting against him and looking round at the scenery. It looked like the deserts and salt pans she saw on TV, areas like the Mikgadikgadi, but parts of it had plants as well, some lush greenery and even the odd oasis. Hopefully, if they ran out of water they would be able to fill up again somewhere.

Behind them, another wagon was following, just far back enough for Fred and Daphne to be oblivious to its presence but to be able to keep an eye on them at the same time. The bulky shape of Pound was obvious at the front, and behind it skulked Ruxus, dark and surly but excited and beginning to form his plans in his head.

Behind him stood the reluctant shape of Mitchell.

Mitchell hadn't wanted to come along at first, since he still felt awkward about the whole situation; technically, he was blood-related to this man he was pursuing. After some time, Ruxus had persuaded him to come along, but it took a while.

"This organisation needs you, Mitchell! You're one of our best, and this is a big mission," he had said back in HQ. Mitchell had accepted after Ruxus told him that he wouldn't have to kill either person, but the scorn in Ruxus's dark eyes had almost made him back out again. He knew Ruxus was ruthless, unmerciful, bloodthirsty and a kleptomaniac in the making. It didn't stop him feeling an odd sort of attachment to him.

"Can you still see them, Honourable?" Ruxus asked eagerly, peering out between his commander and his acquaintance to look over the horizon. Pound nodded.

"They're in my sight, Ruxus."

His own eagerness and anticipation for this was overriding his annoyance at the young boy behind him, who normally would have been screamed at several times for his constant asking and talking and muttering but whom Pound couldn't yell at right now for fear of letting their ex-captives know they were there and following them. The man settled instead for grinding his teeth and glaring back at the boy with his dark eyes silencing his eager talk.

"Shut up, child, and wait for my order to talk again," he hissed, and Ruxus gave a feeble snarl back and sat down next to Mitchell, who was determinedly looking anywhere but the wagon they were following.

"Too feeble to apprehend these world-travellers, are we, fool?" he snarled, and Mitchell simply looked away, not even bothering to reply.

Pound ignored the hissed insults in the back, his eyes fixed on the silhouette in the distance and his fists clenched around the reins.

"I will get you… You'll be sorry you were ever born!"

* * *

"Any movement at all?" Velma asked a nurse, who nodded.

"Almost equally active today. Daphne woke up with some more "Help me or they'll kill me" this morning and Fred just about managed the same. He's tired, very tired. I don't know if he can keep it up."

Velma nodded, looking round and seeing the ward door behind the nurse.

"Are Shag and Scoob in there?"

"Yes. The doctor's not happy about letting a dog into the hospital, but since these are exceptional circumstances and you are Mystery Inc. we're letting you."

"Thank you," Velma murmured, walking past and opening the door softly. Shaggy stood up and shook his head.

"They said if Freddy doesn't wake up soon, he'll- he'll be- too weak to live."

Velma nodded slightly, turning and focusing on Scooby as he whined and pawed gently at Fred's limp arm, lying on the mattress in front of them. Velma sat down and looked straight into Scooby's dark chocolate eyes, her own serious and solemn behind her thick glasses.

"Scooby, you do know about death, don't you?"

Scooby nodded, whining still, hesitant and not liking where this was going.

"Well… there is a chance… a small chance at the moment, but it might get bigger… that Freddy and Daphne will die. If that does happen… we'll be split up as a group. We won't be Mystery Inc. any longer, we'll be a part of it. We'll still be together, but they'll be gone and you won't be able to talk to them, or contact them, or anything."

Scooby whined louder, turning away and resting his head on Fred's arm, letting tears spill onto his friend's strong young forearm and trying not to let the images of what the world would be like minus Fred and Daphne invade his mind. Velma stroked his back gently, putting her arm round Shaggy, who was looking round at Daphne's limp form and mentally screaming at both her and Fred to wake up, regain consciousness, come back to them and return the world to normal.

"Miss Dinkley? Mr Rogers?"

One of the nurses walked in and motioned for them to turn round.

"The parents of the patients would like to visit, and we can't have too many people in here at a time, so would you be willing to leave?"

As a group, they nodded, each turning and giving some kind of farewell message to Fred and Daphne before walking quietly out and taking in the sights of the Joneses and the Blakes, both looking equally shocked and afraid and almost as though they were grieving already, from the greyness of their skin and the swollen cheeks and eyes that showed tears had been running freely for some time.

"What is this coming to?" Velma sighed to herself as she grabbed a muesli bar from a snack machine and sat down outside the ward, thinking of happier times in a bid to save her from picturing the possible future, living as half of the famous group slashed so casually overnight.

* * *

"When do we strike, honourable?"

Ruxus was sat up on the back of the wagon, peering into the distance with the piercing gaze of an eagle stalking its prey, his dark eyes not once leaving the sight of the small wagon trailed by a cloud of dust and holding two people and his hopes of being all-mighty and powerful. Pound grunted from in front of him.

"Patience, fool. We must pick exactly the right time to take them on, and that means when they have found the IDVP. First we will kill them to trap their mana here, and then we will travel through to their world and bring back all the people there to die here and make this the dominant universe."

Ruxus frowned at this, wondering if they should kill all those people- after all, these were his future slaves, in his mind- but he let it slip, smiling at the thought of his ideas for forcing them to breed. A law saying that all those who did not have children would be put to death- that ought to do it.

"Very well, honourable," he muttered, turning and seeing Mitchell staring into space, his thoughts on the people on the wagon in front of him and in this different universe. Pound planned for them all to die? Each one, even though they had done nothing wrong…

He was jolted away from his thoughts as the wagon went over a particularly violent rut in the dusty floor and Pound and Ruxus were almost thrown out; Mitchell landed with an "oof!" on the floor and picked himself up quickly as Ruxus laughed quietly behind him, swearing under his breath and regretting allowing Ruxus to bring him on this mission.

* * *

Mrs Jones was in a daze.

All she could hear was the bleeping of the pulse monitor… all she could smell was the hospital smell of steriliser and medicine and cheap air-freshener… all she could taste was the metallic tang of the water from the fountain in the corner… all she could feel was the hardness of the hospital chair under her legs and the softness of the shirt she was stroking gently, warm from the skin under it… and all she could see was her son's closed eyes and his steady but weak breathing.

Her senses were focused firmly on her little boy as her fingers slowly moved up and down his arm, rumpling the hospital shirt but not caring. Next to her, Mr Jones was standing up, tears threatening the chocolate-brown eyes he had failed to pass on to his son as they took the sight in with dread.

"He's holding on," he whispered to his wife, and she nodded and stood up shakily.

"We'd better leave, Mitchell'll be here soon and we don't want to miss him. He said he'd visit tomorrow, he'll be too tired from the drive here."

Mr Jones nodded and they walked out just as Mrs Blake burst into tears next to the bed opposite.

"Daphne…" she gasped through her tears, clutching her daughter's hand as though she would never let go, her thick red hair falling over her face and becoming a net for her salty teardrops as they fell thick and fast. Mr Blake put his hand on his wife's shoulder and gently reached down to wipe a tear from Daphne's limp arm, stroking his daughter's soft skin, willing her to wake up inside and wishing she would hear him.

"She'll be OK," he murmured, sighing gently as Mrs Blake's body was racked with sobs for her little girl. She was a mother whose daughter looked as though she was somewhere on the thin line between life and death; there could be no experience more traumatic for her, unless it was some sort of sick torture by some twisted, evil mind such as the one possessed, unknown to the Blakes, worlds away by Ruxus. Had they known the danger their child was in in that world, Mrs Blake would probably have been too scared even to cry.

A doctor gently directed the Blakes away as visiting time ended.

Long after they had left, Fred Jones and Daphne Blake slept on, on separate beds, machines beeping by their sides and nurses bustling in and out, sometimes stopping to alter settings on the monitors or check doses of drugs but more often than not simply going straight through to the next ward.

Tranquil in one world. In mortal danger in another. Perhaps dramatic statements, but all too true for Fred and Daphne.

* * *

Lying back, Fred reached up with one aching finger and traced the constellation Orion, remembering his dad teaching him the stars and their names when he was little and finding some solace in the memory.

"Betelgeuse," he murmured, finding the star and smiling as he recalled his father teaching him to say it and his young tongue stumbling over the syllables, somehow coming up with "bottled guess". Daphne shifted slightly next to him and smiled.

"You forgot Rigel," she told him, pointing at it and letting her hand fall over his stomach, feeling it rise and fall with each breath. He sucked his breath in sharply as soon as she had touched it, wincing, and Daphne pulled her hand back, her eyes questioning and concerned. He shook his head.

"Just- it's nothing. It was like that pain in my dream. It doesn't matter."

Daphne nodded and kissed him gently, nodding off on his shoulder and taking him with her to slumber land with her warm weight.

They had only seconds to sleep before a gunshot cracked into the air and Daphne screamed.

* * *

A/N: Ooh, lovely… I can have fun with this one! Please review, I'm sorry this has been so long but I've been distracted. Sorry again! It won't happen again! *slaps cheek* Hope you enjoyed it, thanks for reading! Jazzola :)


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